


A Heart on Fire

by bellarkesupernova



Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, F/M, Fluff, Friends to Lovers, Valentine's Day, Valentine's Day Fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-14
Updated: 2016-02-14
Packaged: 2018-05-20 08:30:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,914
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5998993
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bellarkesupernova/pseuds/bellarkesupernova
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>If there was anything Bellamy knew for sure about Clarke it was that, 1. if you talked to her before she had two cups of coffee that day, she would kill you, 2. she hates to lose an argument, and 3. she despises Valentine's Day vehemently. Bellamy was looking to change that last one.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Heart on Fire

Bellamy walked into Clarke's dorm to see her sitting on her bed, holding a lighter to a Valentine's Day party flyer.

"I wonder if this is flammable," Clarke mused, holding the flame near enough to the flyer that the edges began to darken, but not so close that it caught fire.

"Considering it's paper, I'd imagine so." Bellamy wasn't surprised to see Clarke doing this. If there was anything he knew for sure about Clarke it was that, 1. if you talked to her before she had two cups of coffee that day, she would kill you, 2. she hates to lose an argument, and 3. she despises Valentine's Day vehemently.

Bellamy met Clarke their first year at university; she was in his history class and they formed a study group with some other kids, but by the end of the semester, they were the only two still meeting. Their relationship, if you could even call it that, was not very friendly at first. They were both competitive, so study sessions turned into 'who knows more about this' matches and, needless to say, their peers weren't exactly fighting for a spot in their study group. Sassy remarks and sarcastic comments made up their conversations, and at some point during the year they started to enjoy them. Now, three years later, they shared a dorm room. By choice.

"So, what's it gonna be this year?" Bellamy asks, snatching the paper out of Clarke's hand before she has a chance to burn the building down. Clarke scoffs and puts down the lighter.

"I haven't decided yet. I'm thinking we can stand outside a popular restaurant and make couples feel super awkward by listing off all the reasons why this holiday is incredibly pointless. You aren't seeing anyone, right? Because this is a two person job."

Bellamy crumpled up the flyer and threw it at her head. "I'm not seeing anyone, but no, we aren't doing that. This year I get to pick what we do."

Clarke looked at him curiously, squinting her eyes. "Why?"

"Because you hate this day too much for someone who doesn't care about it, so I'm gonna change that."

"First off, I _don't_ care about it. And second, you can't change my mind."

Bellamy knew one word that would rev Clarke up. "Bet?" He raised an eyebrow at her.

She tilted her head and started smiling at him. He knew she couldn't turn down a challenge. "You're on."

"Twenty bucks?"

"Fifty." Clarke was feeling pretty confident about this.

"It's a deal," Bellamy said. He reached over his bed toward Clarke's and held out his hand, which she shook. Bellamy immediately started planning, he had eight hours to plan the perfect day for Clarke, one that could change even the most stubborn person's opinion of Valentine's Day. It's a good thing Bellamy knew Clarke better than anyone.

* * *

Clarke woke up to the smell of freshly brewed coffee, which she rightfully guessed was the handiwork of Bellamy. He of all people knew what she was like if she didn't get her morning fix.

"Get up." Bellamy ripped the blankets off Clarke and held the cup of coffee in front of her. She guzzled it down even though it was steaming and handed the empty cup back to him.

"So, what's on the menu for today?" Clarke asked, curious as to what Bellamy thought would be fun for her.

"A movie."

"A movie?" Clarke repeated back to him, dryly. 

"Just shut up and get ready. The movie starts at noon and it's a quarter to eleven."

Clarke obeyed, grabbing her shower caddy and leaving the room. She didn't want to conform to societal ideals that a girl has to dress herself up for a day that, in reality, is just like any other, but she didn't exactly want to smell, either. 

When Clarke got back to the room, Bellamy was already dressed and fixing his hair. He had the kind of hair that looked good natural, tousled but not too wild, but Clarke saw him adding in a little bit of product to keep it looking that way all day.

"Almost ready?" He asked her.

"Yeah, just let me grab one more thing." She grabbed an empty water bottle from her desk and the bottle of vodka Bellamy had hidden in his dresser. She filled her water bottle up to the brim.

"What the hell are you doing?"

"I'm not a fan of people. This should help." She tossed it in her bag and walked out, leaving Bellamy to stare at her as she went, not comprehending why this girl was the way she was...and why he loved her so goddamn much.

He didn't always love her. In fact, when they first met, he hated her. He thought Clarke was another uptight, cocky, rich girl. Their arguments, which usually ended in one of them storming off, eventually started to end in laughter or deeper conversation that opened his eyes up to the real Clarke and why she believed the things that she did. They didn't spend Valentine's Day together that first year because they were barely friends, so Bellamy didn't get to see her hatred for it firsthand until second year of university. They stayed up all night talking, first about the day itself, but then about their life and their pasts. He found out her first boyfriend had made her the other woman, and the girl Clarke dated next moved across the country without even talking to her. Clarke claims that her strong dislike for the lovers' day didn't come from that, but deep down Bellamy could see how scarred Clarke's heart was. It's why she comes off as cold when people first meet her. She closes off her heart until she feels she can trust them, and even then they may never get all of her. Bellamy spent most of that night just listening to the sound of her voice, hoarse from the alcohol they'd shared, but he revealed bits of his past too. He talked about his mother, who had passed away just a few years before, and of his younger sister who he loved more than life itself. Clarke told him about her father, who had died around the same time that Bellamy's mother had. They bonded over this. "We can form the 'dead parents club'," Clarke had joked, but not even the alcohol was strong enough to hide the way her voice quivered. They had both been broken, and it was that night that Bellamy wanted more than anything to help put her back together, and maybe repair himself in the process.

With one last glance in the mirror, Bellamy grabbed the movie tickets and locked the door behind him.

* * *

"I can't believe where we are," Clarke said, leaning up against the iron bars of the cell her and Bellamy were in.

"Maybe if you weren't so aggressive to strangers we wouldn't be in this mess." Bellamy replied, his eyes closed as he sat against the stone wall. 

Clarke huffed and joined him, "Maybe if strangers weren't so stupid I wouldn't have to be aggressive."

"Clarke, you threw vodka at his face."

"I forgot it wasn't water. And, besides, you're the one who punched him."

"Because he looked like he was about to strangle you."

"I can take care of myself."

"Obviously."

"Trust me, if you'd heard what that guy said to me, you would have thrown vodka in his face too."

"Okay, well now that I know you can't be trusted in public, you're going back to the dorm and I'll meet you there in an hour."

"We're still—" Clarke was going to say that they were still stuck in there, but as if on cue, Bellamy's younger sister, Octavia, walked in with her boyfriend, Lincoln. She was just nineteen, three years younger than Bellamy and Clarke, but Lincoln was twenty-three.

"Don't expect Lincoln to pull any more strings for you guys." Octavia said, as Lincoln opened the cell.

"Don't worry," Clarke hugged Octavia hello. 

Bellamy shook Lincoln's hand, "Thanks man, sorry for the inconvenience."

"It's alright, just try not to let it happen again."

"So where are you going?" Clarke turned to Bellamy.

"To get some stuff."

"Well that's not vague at all."

"Just go back to the dorm, I'm not going to let being arrested ruin this da—" Bellamy was about to say "date" until he caught himself, "day," he finished.

"Fine," Clarke huffed, "Octavia, can I get a ride back?"

"Sure thing. See you later, big brother."

"Stay out of trouble, O."

"Pfft. You're one to talk." With that, Octavia, Clarke, and Lincoln left a smiling Bellamy.

* * *

Bellamy burst through the door, "Change of plans, you need to leave the room."

Clarke was hanging off her bed, head first, reading a book upside down. "Why?" She pulled herself back to an upright position, making her feel dizzy.

"Because it's a surprise. I just need like half an hour." He had bags of stuff that Clarke couldn't see, but she was instantly curious. She hopped off the bed and tried to peak in one, but Bellamy slapped her hand away.

"Fine, I'll be across the hall at Raven's. Let me know when you're done with," she gestured vaguely, "whatever this is."

Once Clarke was out of sight, Bellamy started setting up the two easels he'd bought along with a dozen bottles of paint. Valentine's Day was about spending time with the person you love, and even if Clarke didn't love him in /that/ way, he knew she loved him. But for Clarke to be having a good time, she had to be doing something she liked, hence the painting. The pizza arrived right on time, and Bellamy shouted down the hall for Clarke to come. 

When Clarke walked in, her eyes lit up. She loved to paint, but being a student full time and working whenever she had a chance got in the way of it. Bellamy had two easels set up in front of her bed, one for each of them, she was guessing, and three boxes of pizza on his bed.

"Oh my god, Bellamy," she turned to him, "thank you."

Bellamy wasn't expecting that at all. She didn't even say it sarcastically.

She went straight to his bed and opened a box, devouring the pizza. "I'm starving," she said, between bites.

"Yeah, well, don't get used to it," He tried to brush off the embarrassment he felt for his heart skipping a beat when she looked at him so sincerely, "I just really want to win."

"Uh huh, sure," she replied, with her mouth full of food.

"You're disgusting." He grabbed a slice himself and started eating, shaking his head at how gross she was while the slight grin on his face betrayed him.

After they ate (all three boxes of pizza, just between the two of them), they moved over to Clarke's bed and poured the paint onto paper plates. They spent the next three hours painting, and after about twelve sheets of canvas paper, Clarke even painted a heart, albeit it was in black. Clarke mocked Bellamy for his failed attempts at painting, laughing especially hard at his painting of her ("Paint me like one of your French girls," she had told him, spreading out across his bed, posing). 

Bellamy couldn't help but feel like maybe what he felt wasn't unrequited, not with her looking at him the was she did when she thought he wasn't looking. Not with the way she put her head on his shoulder while they talked about how absurd it was that they were arrested not five hours before. Not with the way she jerked her hand away when his accidentally touched hers while grabbing a paint brush. Not with the way she blushed when he told her that anyone who had broken her heart missed out on the most incredible woman. Bellamy knew he shouldn't get his hopes up, but goddamn if the thought didn't make him feel like the luckiest man alive.

"And now for the main event," Bellamy said in an announcer voice, "Scrabble." He started setting up the board on the floor.

Scrabble was the first game Clarke ever challenged Bellamy to, which he won (though Clarke refuses to believe he didn't cheat), and just seeing it brought back a lot of memories to Clarke; those cancelled classes when they had time to spare and wanted to do anything but school work, all those late nights when insomnia hit her like a train and Bellamy offered to stay up and play her. Clarke didn't think that Bellamy knew just how much he meant to her, how she wouldn't have made it this far had they not met that first year. He was the most important person in her life, and it crossed her mind all the time that she loved him. Even in a romantic way, though of course she would never tell Bellamy. She's been burned too much to get close to sparks, for fear they may catch light. Either he would break her heart, or she would break his. Clarke knew how the story would end.

Because of how intense Bellamy and Clarke both were, Scrabble was fucking intense. Their games could last a couple of hours and they were constantly challenging each other's words. About forty minutes into the game, Bellamy looked down at his letters and realized something. He had the letters E, M, S, S, K, and J, and there was a letter I on the board that was open. His letters could spell 'KISS ME.' Maybe it was the vodka, or the whole day they'd had together, but Bellamy decided to just say 'fuck it' and play the letters.

"Do I even have to challenge you on that one?" Clarke asked him, before she noticed the way his head was still turned down at the board and the way she could see the slightest blush on his face, even with his darker skin. She silently panicked because she didn't know if he was being serious, or if she wanted him to be. And somehow, in that millisecond of confusion, she decided to do the most childish thing in hopes of breaking the tension.

* * *

"Seriously, Bellamy. Come out." Clarke knocked on the bathroom stall that Bellamy had locked himself in.

"You looked me in the eyes, leaned in, and then burped."

"It was funny!"

"It was gross and embarrassing," Bellamy opened the door, "I was being serious and putting my heart out there and you made it into a joke."

"Well what did you expect me to do, Bellamy? You're my best friend."

"And maybe I want to be more," he shoved his hands in his pockets and looked down at her, the alcohol making him more honest than he would normally be, more honest than logic would tell him to be.

Clarke was struck by this, but she found herself taking a step closer. "You do?" Her voice was quieter now, a result of her barriers falling down around her.

"Yes."

They were so close in that moment, close enough that Clarke could count every freckle on his face, and she wanted to kiss him. She leaned in, but then stopped.

"Wait—" She started.

"Oh my god, Clarke, _again? Really?_ " He stepped back but she caught his wrist.

"Bell, look at where we are. I'm not going to kiss you in the fucking men's restroom."

He looked away for a second, thinking about something, before turning back to her with a wide grin on his face and saying, "I have an idea."

He dragged her out of the bathroom and to the elevator where they awkwardly stood with other students until they got to the bottom floor. They went running through the recreational and study room, Bellamy practically dragging Clarke, until they finally got to the doors that led outside. When Bellamy stepped outside he let out an underwhelming "oh."

"What the hell?" Clarke asks, bending over to try to catch a breath.

"I thought it was raining. It would've made for a very cliche first kiss. Guess I was wrong." He turned to go back inside and upstairs but Clarke caught his wrist again, this time pulling him close enough that she could run her hands through his hair. 

"Oh no," She said, looking back and forth between his eyes and his lips, "Not before we do this." When she pressed her lips against his she knew that not even rain could have made it feel better.

* * *

Back in their room, they were tangled up in Bellamy's bed. Her head was on his chest as she listened to the relaxing sound of his breath, and he ran a hand through her hair.

After a few minutes Bellamy shook her a bit and said, "Hey, you know what?"

"Hmm?" Clarke moved her head so she was looking directly at him.

He looked right in her eyes, leaned in, and burped. Then, with a smug look on his face, he said, "I won."

She slapped his chest, "Bellamy Bradbury Blake, you are disgusting."

"I'll be nice and not make you pay me the fifty bucks."

"Ever the gentleman," Clarke smiled and kissed him again, letting her tongue roam his mouth. She felt sparks, but she wasn't afraid of them any longer, because if her heart caught fire, so did his, and their hearts would burn as one.

**Author's Note:**

> Come talk to me on [tumblr](http://www.freckledrebelking.tumblr.com)!


End file.
